


An American Holiday

by Ilthit



Category: Modesty Blaise - Peter O'Donnell
Genre: F/M, Male-Female Friendship, Yuletide 2011
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-22
Updated: 2011-12-22
Packaged: 2017-10-27 18:29:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,070
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/298753
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ilthit/pseuds/Ilthit
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Willie and Modesty go to San Francisco and regret it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	An American Holiday

**Author's Note:**

  * For [wtb](https://archiveofourown.org/users/wtb/gifts).



This high up the wind is freezing no matter how cloudless the sky or how hot the sands on the beaches below. Though sports goggles cover her eyes, Modesty's face is stung pink by the chill. The metal she clings to is slippery, so she wraps her arms and legs around the helicopter's skid and holds on to the friction of her own jacket and trousers.

She gestures to Willie, who's clambered up and now straddles the other skid, bending low to stay out of the pilot's line of sight. He nods and signals back. They both have to be ready so neither is knocked off when the helicopter rolls.

Modesty swings herself up and knocks on the window.

She smiles sweetly at the pilot as his jaw drops. Meanwhile, Willie opens the opposite door.

-

“Well, that was fun,” says Modesty when they get back to her hotel room, a three-room suite high up on one of the beach-facing luxury hotels. She shrugs off her torn jacket and drops it on the back of a chair. Her arms are covered in bruises.

With the helicopter intercepted and guided back down to San Francisco, the last of the drug smugglers' stash is recovered and secure in the evidence locker, and another little adventure has been brought to a close. Modesty never grins, but Willie loves the way joy radiates off her on such occasions, right after they've done something most people, people who haven't learned to think these things through properly, would consider impossible or reckless. It's not anything specific: her movements become just slightly faster, and even her perpetual calm seems charged with energy. Thinking about it now, Willie remembers seeing her the same way after a concert or a gallery visit she's particularly enjoyed.

They're so alike it scares him sometimes. He, too, can feel the tingle of adrenaline still on his skin, the joy of an aching body, and he, too, refuses to waste the experience by jumping and shouting. It's better just to absorb it. It will turn into exhaustion soon enough.

He fixes a drink without needing to ask for permission, and doesn't say how strange it is that they can't have a single holiday without ending up dangling off things, because they both know they love dangling more than sunbathing. If there was any mistake, it was made when they decided to come to San Francisco instead of Laos as they had originally planned. If Willie cared to dwell on it, he could lay blame on the decision to ally with the British government in the first place. A private person could do so much more in Laos than an agent with government ties and yet not provoke an international incident.

If hassling hard drug traffickers is the most fun Willie and Modesty can have in San Francisco, then so be it. Without fun, they might as well go straight back home.

Modesty steps in front of the panorama windows. The view from the 12th floor is of bright, sunny calm, a brilliant sea stretching out to meet an even more vibrant blue on the horizon, and the golden beach below milling with tourists. Willie finds it beautiful in its own way, though nothing to compare to either the rolling hills of English countryside or the thick, poisonous lushness of the Amazon.

“I've been thinking,” says Modesty, her fingers tracing the edges of a bruise, “about a cross-country trip.”

“The legendary Route 66, eh, Princess?” Willie says, grinning. “Let me guess. You'd be paying visits to some of our old mates.”

They don't, as a rule, go looking for trouble. Pushing boundaries in sports or a series of perfectly legal adventures in the harsher regions of the world is usually quite enough. There are exceptions, such as when an opportunity for trouble presents itself in a such way that it's difficult to ignore.

The Network left a number of loose strings when it disbanded, and while Modesty is on good terms with most of her former employees, some have taken to careers she never approved of. Going after them is a little like cleaning house, but it has to be done little by little, or even the two of them can find themselves with more trouble than they can handle.

“Oh, you can stay, if you like,” Modesty says instead of answering the question, and gives Willie a knowing smile. “I know Madhuja would like it.”

“You think?” Willie tries to sound non-committal, but she's hit the nail on the head. He met Madhuja on the plane. She is very nearly as enticing as danger.

In the end, Modesty goes alone, but Willie agrees to meet her in New York in three weeks' time.

-

“I'm trying to understand,” Madhuja says as she stamps a cigarette out on the ashtray on the bedside table. She's naked and glorious, astride him.

“You're not the only one, love,” he says, mellow and sated enough that he doesn't even mind having this conversation again.

“I know you care about her. I don't know where she's gone, but I have a feeling it's something dangerous. Yet you let her go alone. Don't you worry?”

Willie barks a laugh. “That's what you don't get, is it?”

Madhuja frowns and tosses her head. “Did I say something funny?”

“No, no,” Willie rushes to reassure her. “It's just that... that's not what most people ask.”

Madhuja shrugs. “My brother's a soldier. I worry every night when he's away. So why don't you?”

“You brother,” Willie says, weighing his words. “You let him join up, didn't you?”

“Of course. It was always his dream.”

“Well, there you go, love,” says Willie, and grins when he sees her eyes light up with understanding. “You can't stop someone you care about living the life he or she chooses. Besides, the Princess always knows what she's doing. You should worry about me.” He tickles her waist and she squirms and giggles and hits him with a pillow.

-

Modesty makes it to New York on time, but Willie is two days late, having had to rescue Madhuja from a Californian cult that wanted her to bear the new Messiah. He buys Modesty a bottle of wine by way of apology and tells her all about it while they sit on a bench in Long Island, watching the city lights turn on as the sun sinks behind the horizon.


End file.
